It has been some time since TFA came to theaters last December. Now that the dust has settled, and we have had ample time and likely a viewing in your own home, what are your thoughts on it? To be honest not much has changed of my opinion. I think there was some good parts to the move but they didn't out weigh the bad. I really liked Rey, the comedy, the Star Wars feel it had. But it is way too close to A New Hope, almost scene to scene close. I don't want to list all the similarities so look them up online yourself in you want a side by side comparison. Not to mention all of the open ended questions such as the history of the rebellion and empire evolving into the resistance and the first order. I really think they should have kept who Hans son was until their conversation on the bridge. Why spoil he is Hans son within the first ten minutes? With the big budget and all the different types of planets they could have done, I was disappointed they went with another desert themed planet...again. 6 of the seven movies have a desert planet in them. I wanted to like this movie I really did. I believe someone on the Nova podcast said that with all of the Star Wars movies coming out, one of them was bound to be a bit disappointing. I think TFA is that movie. I am very hopeful for the others and I think Rogue One will be amazing.

I still absolutely love it and am baffled by those that don't.

I was "meh" about it the first time I saw it.

Then I saw it a second time and loved it. It was like a switch was flipped or something. Looking forward to watching it with the fam tonight.

It has been some time since TFA came to theaters last December. Now that the dust has settled, and we have had ample time and likely a viewing in your own home, what are your thoughts on it? To be honest not much has changed of my opinion. I think there was some good parts to the move but they didn't out weigh the bad. I really liked Rey, the comedy, the Star Wars feel it had. But it is way too close to A New Hope, almost scene to scene close. I don't want to list all the similarities so look them up online yourself in you want a side by side comparison. Not to mention all of the open ended questions such as the history of the rebellion and empire evolving into the resistance and the first order. I really think they should have kept who Hans son was until their conversation on the bridge. Why spoil he is Hans son within the first ten minutes? I wanted to like this movie I really did. I believe someone on the Nova podcast said that with all of the Star Wars movies coming out, one of them was bound to be a bit disappointing. I think TFA is that movie. I am very hopeful for the others and I think Rogue One will be amazing.

I've seen a fan theory recently predicting that Rey is Anakin reincarnated....I love the theory and the evidence put behind it is actually quite solid! It fully explains the similarities between Jakku and Tatooine, as well as how she seems to know the force so well. I liked it so much I have kind of convinced myself that is what they are planning, as it is so much better than her just turning out to be Luke's daughter (predictable).

I have similar opinions to you, I am hopeful that the story as a whole is complicated and not as straight forward as it has been put out to be in TFA.

Lack of familiar planets bugged me, lack of ships also. I liked most of the characters but more aliens would have been nice.

Overall It was solid but safe.

I agree, it's a 3 out of 5 for me. I enjoyed it but of all the stories they could tell they film a virtually identical version of A New Hope with less charm.

I agree, it's a 3 out of 5 for me. I enjoyed it but of all the stories they could tell they film a virtually identical version of A New Hope with less charm.

3/5 is an apropriate rating. I wish more people had the ability to differentiate better than just 5/5 or 0/5.

I was positively suprised when I first saw the movie, but it didn't quite take me away. After a second time in cinema I did fall in love with it because knowing I would enjoy the ride I wasn't anywhere near as tense and was actually able to see the little things. There is critique that is legitimate to this movie, but a lot of it is things that just can't bother me. I can't wait for the DVD release over here!

It certainly wasn't bad, but they definitely did some bad stuff, and didn't exploit it to its full potential.

I still absolutely love it and am baffled by those that don't.

One of the biggest complaints of the EU was constant repetition of, "Oh no, new super weapon, we gotta kill it!" and, "Oh no, the Empire's back again!".

A lot of people were hoping that would change. They were disappointed.

Not to mention the lead villain is a horrible character, and his sidekick makes Fett look like a dynamic character with a ton of development.

Overall I enjoyed the film, but I liked the overall story and feel of Legacy of the Force better.

I think with the huge expectations the movie had, one showing isn't enough to judge the film. I didn't know what to think when I first saw it, I really enjoyed my first viewing, but the second viewing I really liked it, and after that, I saw it one more time in theaters and loved it. Now I can't wait to buy it.

Some People had way too high of expectations going into it, but once your past that and you actually sit and watch it without those expectations, It's such a fun and entertaining movie that leaves you excited for the future films.

I really think this movie was a Huge success. Yes it lines up with a new hope closely, but it's all new content. A new hope was a revolutionary movie, and I'm a star wars fan all the way, since I was a kid, but I'm also a film fan, and the characters are much deeper, most the characters in episode 4 represent characters in other big films, obi Wan being the old Japanese master, darth vader the Dracula/Frankenstein esq villain. Han the wild west gun slinger, Leia the princess. While in the force awakens the characters are a little deeper, especially Kylo ren, and the dialog in episode 7 is better too. The. Death star rip off is the only flat part to me, but it's really not the focus of the film at all, just something for the hero's to overcome. Plus there was way more real danger in the episode 7, you actually felt risk for the characters. I really think it takes my 3rd place spot in the whole series, and it's neck and neck for second actually

As a stand alone Star Wars film 2.5/5. As a feel good spoof 5/5.

Look at it like space balls 5/5. Look at it like Empire Strikes Back / Heir to the Empire.... maybe 2.5.

Fun yes, serious, no.

The surface plot is close to ANH. What those things all mean is nothing like ANH.

It was a fun ride back into Star Wars, and that's what it was meant to be. Now that the foundation has been laid, the new movies will hopefully give new and exciting flavors to our beloved Galaxy far far away....

I loved it. I felt it had the strongest characters and acting since Empire, really good dynamics better the people on the screen.

The plot is enjoyable for me because I see it in the Star Wars ring theory perspective, where the narrative of Star Wars intentionally repeats between the originals, prequels and sequels. And how history repeats when the people who remember it all shy away from the future.

I give it a solid 4 out of 5.

I'm giving this one a pardon on the unoriginal story, because I think they needed to focus on the characters, which they did very well. Now I care about what happens to them in the next two movies. If the parallels continue, however, I'll start to complain. Overall, very pleased.

I love it. Completely and absolutely despite its flaws. Just to age myself, I'm one of those that saw the original in a drive-in*.

I think the team behind the movie had a tough job in front of them and pulled it off exceptionally well. They needed to save face with a legion of fans (myself included) who were sour after Episodes I-III. They also needed to win over a whole new legion of fans at the same time. Did they lean on the crutch of some of the the original story a bit too much? Maybe, maybe not. But they put enough of their own twist on it to make it their own.

I'm also gonna post this here cause I haven't had a better place to use it.

* I'm not saying I'm any bigger a fan than a youngling that just saw TFA for the first time. We all love the movies. That's why we are here.

I give it a solid 4 out of 5.

I'm giving this one a pardon on the unoriginal story, because I think they needed to focus on the characters, which they did very well. Now I care about what happens to them in the next two movies. If the parallels continue, however, I'll start to complain. Overall, very pleased.

I agree. We need to see the trilogy as a whole before we start worrying about copycatting.

Second best star wars film. Granted that isn't too hard since you can immediately ignore the prequels (although 3 stands up surprisingly well to later viewings). As far as a "Quality Film," it can't even come close to Empire (but then, neither can any other star wars movie). As a "Fun Movie" I think it's better than ANH or ROTJ. If certain parts of Jedi were removed, it may be a different story. I feel that Jedi has among the best "beats" among all the films (the final battle between Luke and Vader, the space battle in Endor) but they get bogged down too much with other stuff (the first act is just too long, and enough has been said about ewoks to fill volumes).

Episode 7 may parallel New Hope, but there is so much to love, and it brings in a character that has quickly become my favorite Star Wars character: Poe freakin' Dameron. So, long story short, I love it, and my copy is currently sitting outside my door courtesy of Amazon, waiting for me to get home tonight...

It was a decent remake, entertaining but a little too safe. Hopefully the next one won't be The New Order Strikes Back.

I guess why I didn't mind the parallels so much is it felt like the movie was made with so much love for everything Star Wars. And that love comes out in the viewers: Watching my little guy jump out of his seat when Poe does his thing. My little girl having a second kick ass female character to pretend to be. And Rey's Falcon scene still gives me goose bumps after the 5th watching (3 in the theatre, 2 at home last weekend).

It was far from perfect, but it was still a very good movie, IMO.

While there were too many plot parallels to ANH, I never felt that it was overly predictable when watching it the first time.

I feel like a lot of people who I've talked to and didn't like it are holding it to incredibly high standards. I hear a lot of criticism of dialog, no backstory, limited development of certain characters, and campy bits. I've told them to re-watch ANH. If these same standards that where applied to a ANH, they would find that it also has limited backstory, only OK dialog, little development of certain characters, and campy bits (hello R2 and C3PO). I think we tend to idolize things from our past and be more critical of the present.

I'm by no means suggesting that it's not possible to legitimately dislike the movie, I just think that with the exception of the parallel plot, most of the criticisms of TFA are also valid for ANH.

EDIT: For the record, I love ANH.

I personally think that the exact opposite happened as with Phantom Menace: Whereas with TPM people went in convinced that it was going to be a great movie and it took some months for the polish to wear off the turd and people to realize it was bad, with TFA people went in convinced it was going to be a bad movie and it's still gonna take some time for them to realize that it is, in fact, second best of the movies so far.

As far as repeating ANH...

Why do I have to bring up, again and again, Campbell's Monomyth? Ya know, the same one that Lucas used in the original trilogy and that Abrams very intentionally used in TFA?

The idea is simple: Every hero story, from Hercules to Arthur to Batman, follows the same basic pattern. There are differences depending on the character, but it hits the same beats because subconsciously we want the same underlying myth from our heroic stories.

The beats TFA hits the same as ANH are chosen intentionally, which allows the differences between the characters and circumstances to shine through: Luke eagerly leaps for the call to adventure, with the only regret being that his aunt and uncle were killed by the Empire; Rey runs away from it because she is at her core unsure. Starkiller Base succeeds where the Death Star did not because the trilogy needs to disturb the balance between the Empire and Republic. The old-wise-man being killed in each one represents a different ideal: Kylo's sacrifice to the Dark Side, and the reinforcement of Darth Vader's power. So on, and so on.

In fact, the point about Rey made me realize something: the only character who is committed to his path through most of the movie is Poe Dameron. Kylo still wants his mommy and daddy (and the Light Side); Rey would rather accept the safety of waiting for something to happen over the insecurity of MAKING things happen; Finn is the one learning the lesson of "A coward lets fear rule him, a fool feels none"; Han Solo, the man who spent his entire life running away from his mistakes, finally confronts what he feels is his biggest mistake of all...

And someone *cough*paragoombaslayer*cough* had the audacity to claim there were no good quotes from the movie back when it first came out.

"This is the ship that made the Kessel Run in 14 parsecs!"

"It was twelve."

"We'll use the Force."

"That's not how the Force works!"

"Maybe I should convince Supreme Leader Snoke to raise a clone army instead?"

"That ship's garbage!" *EXPLOSION* "...the garbage will do."

"So, uh... who talks first. Do you talk first?"

It's still okay, and only okay.

Given what JJ did to startrek could of been so much worse.

"We'll use the Force."

"That's not how the Force works!"

Followed up with another great line:

"Rowrrr."

"Oh, you're cold?

Honestly, it was "Fun".

But "Fun" in the kind of description you give a movie that was entertaining for a couple hours, and you didn't waste your time or money.

TFA is basically the Lethal Weapon 4 of Star Wars. It had the characters you love, some new characters you kinda like,and the plot moves along competently. But, in the end, it's really only worth a repeat viewing if you come across it on cable on a rainy Sunday afternoon in the football offseason.

Let's just get over the hump right away. The writing is bad. You can tell where a three time Academy Award Nominated screenwriter tried to make a gritty drama, and where the esteemed author of Gone Fishin' and Taking Care of Business tried to turn it into a buddy cop action adventure. The dialog is painfully campy in parts, the action as well.

A good story has the story follow events in a logical order. This happens because of this, which happened because of this. The Force Awakens does essentially the opposite. Events happen in the movie only because they have to, in order to facilitate the next scene. Look! we found a TIE Fighter with two seats! Look, I didn't find my friend who was thrown free of a crash in the open desert so we can have a joyous reunion later! Look, it's the Millennium Falcon! Look, Han Solo found us in the Millennium Falcon! Look, here's Luke's lightsaber in the basement of this random Space Bar! Look, R2D2 woke up and knew what we needed all along!

Nevermind the ridiculous borrowing, they didn't even borrow well. In Return of the Jedi, they knew the protagonists would need some help on Endor, so they sent commandos. The writers figured out a reason to separate the protagonists from the commandos who were less important to the narrative than they were to the story. If life as you know it is about to end. If your entire organization is about to be crushed. And the only way to stop it is to infiltrate a heavily defended space base, do you A: send a crack team of commandos, or B: send a recent defector of untested loyalty and a conflicting goal to save his friend, a seven foot tall unstealthy wookie known for snacking on food he finds left out, and a geriatric smuggler with his own conflicting goal to find his son?

And, there's no arguing it, Rey is is a bad character. She has no character development, and no arc.

The key to TFA's overwhelming success was that it neatly and cleanly skipped over the extremely low bar of "Better than the Prequels".

I had great expectations because I think the director's reboot of Star Trek, the first movie, was brilliant. I still keep watching it. it's tense, exciting, funny, and has a story that makes sense.

so I was disappointed. to my surprise, I wished Lucas had directed it. Now I know Lucas isn't the best director. I know the best movie of the original trilogy is the 2nd which had a different director (more or less). I know Lucas loves cheesy lines and H. Ford was the one who came up with the funny "I love you" "I know". but Lucas has something: he has imagination for world building and tries to show this on screen. the 2nd trilogy, the plot was hilariously bad. J.J. Bink was so annoying, and why on coruscant is such a moron a stand-in for an ambassador of an entire world. Are they out of intelligent people on Naboo? But, I watched the 2nd trilogy several times because it has great world building: think of the world where they make clones. everything is so different, the aliens, the architecture, the waves. then we move to another world, everything is completely different. it's like you're exploring the galaxy. just ignore the cheesy dialogue and nonsensical plot.

but this movie, it had none of that galaxy exploring, and still had a rather nonsensical plot. I have a PhD in physics so when I don't understand something I generally think it's not a fault in my intelligence, but a fault in exposition. what on earth is going on with that planetary weapon, are all the planets in one system? why the evil stormtrooper captain agrees to their demands so easily? are we supposed to care when the capital world is shown for 1 second and immediately destroyed?

why Han, whose character is all about being Han Solo, walks over to obviously be killed immediately? are we supposed to believe that Han didn't know what would happen? are we supposed to believe he was blinded by "fatherly love"? Han? after his son killed young padawans? we're supposed to believe he rides around the galaxy and never goes back to see Leila.

it seems they just brought Han back to kill him off so there could be space for the new characters, which to be honest weren't so memorable anyway.

beside, the exact thing happens over and over. giant death star, even bigger this time, needs to be blown up. boring

The Force Awakens is a great Star Wars film.

It is however, heavily flawed.

Great, but flawed.